UEFA approves the new Champions League: there will also be matches on Thursdays

UEFA unanimously approved the extension and remodeling of the Champions League since 2024 in an Executive Committee marked by the instability caused by the announcement of the Super League. Despite the real threat of spin-off that implies that 12 of its main teams have decided to form a parallel tournament, the highest body continued with its plans and announced a new Champions League with 36 teams and 10 minimum matches to be played by each one, four more than the current ones.

UEFA decided to accept the proposal of the ECA (European Club Association), completely headless after its president, Andrea Agnelli, representative of Juve, and other members of the 12 dissident clubs decided to leave the body that encompassed them. Furthermore, Agnelli was summoned to the Committee as a member, but obviously did not participate.

Novel format

In this way and pending hypothetical negotiations between Superliga and UEFA, There will be 36 -not 32- the clubs that will play the Champions League and each one will play a minimum of 10 games, for the six of now. The major leagues wanted five of their representatives and not four to qualify, but the four new places are distributed among other minor countries.

The main novelty will come in the format. There will be no division by groups, but it will be a league of 36 between all. Each team, according to their ranking, will play two matches against another of their peers, three against groups from Pot 2, three against those from Pot 3 and two before those from Pot 4. The eight best would qualify for the eighth directly and there would be a playoff between the ninth and the twenty-fourth to know the other eight classified. The losers of that playoff would go to the Europa League.

Matches on Thursdays and possible Final Four

The change to a common league of 36 teams will not be the only novelty of this new Champions League, but also there will be games on Thursdays. In general, the days will be on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, leaving Thursdays for the Europa League and the new Conference League, but there will be two exclusive weeks of Champions in which there will be Champions League matches three days a week. Those two weeks neither the UEL nor the UECL will be played, so the competitions will not coincide.

Another novel aspect is the possibility of include a final four to replace the semifinals. This idea still has to be analyzed and it would end the current system of two semi-finals to two parties, to reunite the four classified in the same venue and dispute the semifinals to one match. Something similar to what happened last summer in Lisbon when the competition resumed.